Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to a gate driver that allows for reducing the bezel around a display panel and a display device having the same.
Description of the Related Art
In a display device, data lines and gate lines are arranged to intersect at right angles, and pixels are arranged in a matrix. Video data voltages to be displayed are applied to the data lines, and gate pulses are sequentially supplied to the gate lines. Pixels on display lines to which gate pulses are supplied are supplied with video data voltages, and video data is displayed as all the display lines are sequentially scanned by the gate pulses.
A gate driver for supplying gate pulses to the gate lines on the display device typically comprises a plurality of gate integrated circuits (hereinafter, “IC”). Each gate drive IC basically comprises a shift register because it has to sequentially output gate pulses, and may comprise circuits and output buffers, for adjusting the output voltage of the shift register according to the driving characteristics of the display panel.
In the display device, the gate driver which generates gate pulses, i.e., scan signals, may be implemented in the form of a gate-in-panel (hereinafter, “GIP”) consisting of a combination of thin-film transistors, in the bezel area of the display panel where no image is displayed. The GIP-type gate driver has a number of stages corresponding to the number of gate lines, and the stages output gate pulses to the corresponding gate lines on a one-to-one basis.
A GIP-type shift register can reduce the manufacturing costs of drive circuits because it can take the place of a gate drive IC. However, the increasing complexity of GIP circuits often increases the number of driving signals applied to the GIP circuits. Applying more driving signals to GIP requires more signal lines for applying each of these driving signals. This results in an increase in the size of the bezel around the display panel.